The Future And You
Ideas and opinion about the future based on verifiable facts of today.
 
July 29, 2009 Episode

Nathan P. Butler (a professional educator with eight years of classroom teaching experience) is today's featured guest.

Topics: now that the flood gates of information are open wide (sometimes referred to as the Internet) we are all swimming in information so deep we can't see the bottom.  How this info-flood has changed schools and teaching and students and teachers and homework--even changed what is taught and how it is taught. The struggles teachers face in keeping up with these changes; the struggles students face in an always-online world; the rising importance of context over content; and the mixed bag of good and bad results from all this change.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the July 29, 2009 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 40 minutes]

Nathan P. Butler holds a 'Masters in Education with a Specialization in Integrating Technology in the Classroom.' He is also a groundbreaking podcaster, having been a podcaster years before podcasting had a name or a standardized means of distribution. He is also a mover and shaker in Star Wars Fandom through his work with ChronoRadio and StarWarsFanworks, and for having written an exhaustive thousand-page-long chronology of the Star Wars universe which is titled Star Wars Timeline Gold.

 

Direct download: TFAY_2009_7_29.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:01am EDT

July 22, 2009 Episode

Robert Hooker (an Information Technology professional living in London) is today's featured guest.

Topics: why Islamic fundamentalists feel threatened by the dominance of the Internet today, just as Christian fundamentalists felt threatened by the dominance of TV in the 1960s; now that online dating is a highly profitable business, how dating sites may try to change cultural ideas and habits about dating to stretch those dating years into a lifelong lifestyle to maximize their profits; why Internet technology may have more to do with fashion than with the 'needs' people have (or think they have); how technology is helping people to come together on a global basis and become more of a world community; also: cell phones, global warming and Second Life.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the July 22, 2009 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 36 minutes]

Robert Hooker has a Bachelors degree in Cognitive Sciences from the University of Chicago, and a Masters degree in Sociology from the Open University in Britain. For most of the 1990s Robert worked first as a researcher in Artificial Intelligence at Northwestern University Institute for Learning Sciences (ILS) and then as Web Developer and Entrepreneur. While at the Institute for Learning Sciences he worked with Virtual Reality, web based video delivery, Internet learning and content indexing. Current he works for Fujitsu Services in the United Kingdom. He has lived in London for the last 10 years.

 

Direct download: TFAY_2009_7_22.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:01am EDT

July 15, 2009 Episode

Robert Hooker (an Information Technology professional living in London) is today's featured guest.

Topics: his experience in AI research in the early 1990s; his PhD in sociology and the results of his sociological research inside Second Life; the importance of gender roles in the real world and in virtual worlds; ways to find answers to specific questions online; web page rankings and the google algorithms; and is the Internet is increasing or decreasing global acceptance of diversity?

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the July 15, 2009 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 37 minutes]

Robert Hooker has a Bachelors degree in Cognitive Sciences from the University of Chicago, and a Masters degree in Sociology from the Open University in Britain. For most of the 1990s Robert worked first as a researcher in Artificial Intelligence at Northwestern University Institute for Learning Sciences (ILS) and then as Web Developer and Entrepreneur. While at the Institute for Learning Sciences he worked with Virtual Reality, web based video delivery, Internet learning and content indexing. Current he works for Fujitsu Services in the United Kingdom. He has lived in London for the last 10 years.

 

Direct download: TFAY_2009_7_15.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:01am EDT

July 8, 2009 Episode

Robert Hooker (an Information Technology professional living in London) is today's featured guest.

Topics: powerful software which is totally free to download and use (such as: Open Office, Gimp, and Ubuntu); Web 3.0 verses 2.0; the buzzword The Cloud and what it means to users; trends in Microsoft Office and its global popularity; and the overwhelming reason why users have not adopted Linux even though it is excellent and free.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the July 8, 2009 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 30 minutes]

Robert Hooker has a Bachelors degree in Cognitive Sciences from the University of Chicago, and a Masters degree in Sociology from the Open University in Britain. For most of the 1990s Robert worked first as a researcher in Artificial Intelligence at Northwestern University Institute for Learning Sciences (ILS) and then as Web Developer and Entrepreneur. While at  the Institute for Learning Sciences he worked with Virtual Reality, web based video delivery, Internet learning and content indexing. Current he works for Fujitsu Services in the United Kingdom. He has lived in London for the last 10 years.

 

Direct download: TFAY_2009_7_8.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:01am EDT

July 1, 2009 Episode

Robert Hooker (an Information Technology professional living in London) is our featured guest.

Topics: trends in England and Europe compared to the USA especially involving cell phones, Internet connections, and other technologies. Robert also talks about: the lack of national unity in the UK; bigotry and prejudice in Europe against non-European immigrants and against Eastern Europeans; how globalization is changing Europe (for good and bad); why the impact of China and India are large but completely different; and his observations of trends in North Africa based on the time he spend living in a suburb of Tunis, Tunisia.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the July 1, 2009 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 37 minutes]

Robert Hooker has a Bachelors in Cognitive Sciences  from the University of Chicago and a Masters in Sociology from the Open University in Britain. For most of the 1990s Robert worked first as a researcher in Artificial Intelligence at Northwestern University Institute for Learning Sciences (ILS) and then as Web Developer and Entrepreneur. While at  the Institute for Learning Sciences he worked with Virtual Reality, web based video delivery,  Internet learning and content indexing. Current he works for Fujitsu Services in the United Kingdom. He has lived in London for the last 10 years.

 

Direct download: TFAY_2009_7_1.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:01am EDT